If

He always wondered how his life might have been different if he had or hadn't this or that. It was always the other thing, but that too failed him. If he had flunked his physical, had been drafted and slogged the paddies high on pills and booze, hadn't enlisted in the Air Force before the Army could grab him. If he hadn't been shipped to Vietnam, anyway, laying waste to his careful plan to do his time Stateside, playing golf on weekends, (the Air Force had good food and better golf courses). If he hadn't been on duty in the dead of night for being caught with half a joint. If he hadn't shot the young man trying to get through the perimeter fence, mostly by bouncing off it repeatedly. If the man had been VC or even NVA rather than a drunken local teenager with a clubbed foot. If he hadn't allowed the nightmares to consume him. If he had succeeded just once, whether with pills or razors. If life had been fair, if only a little.